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Community Corner

Carroll Gardens: A Neighborhood Worthy Of Protection

The author of Pardon Me For Asking on why to landmark.

For decades, the Brooklyn neighborhood now known as Carroll Gardens, has been a quiet residential enclave, a time capsule of beautiful mid-1800's brownstones. Its unique, charming front gardens offer a wonderful feeling of space, air and tranquility and provides a sense of relief from the turmoil of city life. The fact that today, Carroll Gardens retains much of its 19th century atmosphere and charm is a testament to the thoughtful and visionary planning by surveyor Richard Butts, who understood what made a neighborhood livable.    

Today, Carroll Gardens is one of the oldest planned communities in the United States.

It is therefore surprising to many that only a very small section of this unique neighborhood is landmarked. When the the New York Landmarks Preservation Commission designated the Carroll Gardens Historic District in 1973, it included  only the buildings on President and Carroll streets between Smith and Hoyt streets and the western ends of the two blocks between President and First streets. Though these two city blocks are certainly architectural jewels, other blocks in the neighborhood are equally worthy of protection, especially the Place blocks with their distinctively wide and ornate brownstones and deep front gardens.

It is time to rectify this oversight. For decades, Carroll Gardens' brownstones were lovingly maintained and handed down from generation to generation, from owner to owner,virtually unchanged. However, just in the last decade, this neighborhood has experienced a surge in development and renovation. Some of the new buildings have been lovely additions to the neighborhood while some others (360 Smith Street and 100 Luquer Street come to mind) are dramatically out of context. They have chipped away at the historic character of Carroll Gardens and have compromised the possibility of landmarking entire blocks. The longer we wait to landmark the neighborhood, the bigger the risk that it will no longer be 'landmarkable.' 

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All over our city and country, people are working to preserve the best buildings and neighborhoods because they recognize the beauty and appreciate the quality of life which attracted them to settle there. These efforts are akin to preserving a family heirloom or antique so that future generations may enjoy what we enjoy. There may be greater sacrifice (financial and bureaucratic) to achieve this goal but Carroll Gardens' brownstone row houses are part of this city and country's heritage, worthy of protection for those who come after us. They have survived almost 150 years and have been delivered to us mostly intact by our predecessors. We should not fail to maintain them for our descendants.

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Katia Kelly is the author of the Pardon Me For Asking blog and a Carroll Gardens resident.

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